


sunny side up

by rensshi



Series: gold [1]
Category: WayV (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ferris Bueller's Day Off AU, Gen, M/M, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-07 15:27:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20978138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rensshi/pseuds/rensshi
Summary: The drive to San Francisco wouldn’t take more than two hours.“Two hours are going to fly by. Before you know it, we’ll be waving Kun goodbye before his flight out of here,” Hendery points out, waiting in silence for a response from the backseat. This was after all, Yangyang’s idea.Alternatively: Yangyang, Hendery and Lucas have a day off.





	sunny side up

**Author's Note:**

> hello to the person who prompted this! ferris bueller's day off is one of my favorite coming of age movies and although i...went off-tangent given the twists i put here since it’s not set in high school, i tried to keep this in line with how the movie personally makes me feel. hope you enjoy! 
> 
> thanks to s for helping me fine tune this, and to anyone who reads this, thanks for giving this a chance <3
> 
> and lastly thank you to the mods for all their hard work T_T

By the time Yangyang feels like he’s baked his left arm out to a crisp on the steering wheel in Lucas’ car, Lucas himself appears, along with Hendery in tow. Yangyang has been hazarding for him by the curb with the No Parking sign right up ahead of him, and he gives Hendery a sunny grin when Hendery squints at him like he can snipe him.

“Should have brought your sunglasses,” Yangyang says when they get in the car. He scrambles out the driver’s seat to let Lucas take over before someone can complain about their car hazarding too long and Hendery digs through his worn backpack and whips out a pair of shades to make a show of putting it on.

“You better give me a good reason to leave work early,” Hendery says, not so much a real threat but a statement said so he can probably feel slightly apologetic about taking hours off his internship.

“Was missing our last road trip after graduation not a good reason?” Lucas asks. 

“Bold of you to assume you could bribe me with _ that _reason—Beijing was fine, thanks!” Yangyang hears Hendery’s flustered response just as he gets into the car. 

Beijing was the reason Hendery couldn’t be with them on their road trip across California after graduation. In the rear view mirror that Yangyang catches a glimpse of himself in, Lucas’s responding smile is blinding. “Too bad. Once I drive off, you’re a willing hostage at this point, no take backs,” Lucas declares and Hendery rolls his eyes next to him.

A car cuts them from the other lane, and Lucas swears. There’s the trickle of trepidation lurching in Yangyang’s stomach, or maybe it’s also because he feels water spill down his chin from the water bottle he just screwed open.

He leans over and sticks head in between the front seats. “Could you change the song?”

Hendery turns up the volume and all Yangyang has to threateningly say is _ Wong Kunhang, fuck you, you can blast All Star all you want later, now please _before Hendery relents and changes the station from a pop song circa 2009 to Ariana Grande.

The day had started off this way:

“Would you be a getaway driver if I need you to be?” Yangyang asks Lucas. Even through Mark squealing when Donghyuck accidentally drops his sundae cone on his bare torso and splatter pathetically on the new hardwood floors that they’d just fitted an hour ago, day 3 of their apartment revamp, organized by Yerim Kim, he can tell Yangyang is smiling through the phone.

“You mean like, as criminals?”

“Maybe. Is that Donghyuck?” Yangyang asks above the shrill sounds.

“Yes. And _ yes, _ I’d be a great getaway driver. I think we’ve had this conversation before with Renjun, but dead bodies involved,” Lucas says, not really thinking through the heat.

“Great. I called in sick.”

“Was it the kebab yesterday? I told you it wasn’t just my indigestion—”

“Nah Xuxi, that was all you. I’m not actually sick, but I called off work today. It’s Hendery’s idea,” Yangyang adds for the sake of it, and he’s pleased when Lucas is silent on the other end, obviously thinking this through better. “Sicheng just _ also _ told me that Kun is back in San Francisco.”

“I heard.”

Yangyang huffs through the phone. “Okay, well—wanna visit him? He’s leaving on Saturday night, ge.” 

It’s how Lucas ends up waiting around at the reception area of where Hendery interns at—this video production house with really just two floors, and a mean-looking coffee machine that they show off to the guests and clients who wait by the stiff couch Lucas was perched on.

“It was _ not _my idea,” Hendery deadpans the moment he hears what Lucas has to say.

“I told Jaehyun and Mark that my grandfather got rushed to the hospital. He’s not at the hospital,” Lucas says quickly before Hendery can offer a hug. “But you can tell Renjun over there that you desperately need a day off.” They eye Renjun nibbling on the straw of his Starbucks drink at the reception. He isn’t the receptionist. Renjun had taken to shifting from the open workspaces upstairs to the reception desk, which was conveniently quiet most of the time because it’s Jaehyun’s spot.

“Didn’t you say your grandfather passed when you were a kid or something? I heard Qian Kun is visiting,” Renjun says, continuing to spin the Avengers-themed pen around with his fingers. Thor’s plastic head at the end hits his laptop screen and it clatters noisily out of his hand and down below Jaehyun’s empty chair. He emerges with the fallen crumpled, recycled Out At Lunch Post-It and sticks it on Jaehyun’s monitor again.

“Ah, well.” No point in pretending. “Wanna come with us to San Francisco?” Lucas offers Renjun an easy grin. 

“No thanks, it’s Friday date night later. At Jaemin’s parents’ house,” Renjun said through his teeth bared in a strained, nervous smile, which makes Lucas coo at him. “But say hi to Kun for me.”

An hour later, the GPS tells Lucas to turn left on the intersection but he ignores the cool voice, heading for a store straight ahead. Hendery turns it off for him; they figure they’ll recalibrate their route later and Yangyang is eager anyway about refreshments ans snacks.

“How was Beijing? I mean, after you went hiking with your family,” Lucas clarifies, glancing at Hendery next to him, who’s fishing out mints.

“Hotter. Like we’d be welded to the seats with our own sweat hot,” Hendery answers after a beat. “Although the food makes up for it.”

“How cold can it get though?” Yangyang asks lazily. “You cannot say it gets as cold as—”

“It _ can _get as cold as Germany. What difference does two or three degrees make?”

It sounds like it can make a whole lot of difference. 

Lucas doesn’t remember anything about Beijing. If he goes, he’d be using what basic Mandarin he’s retained from hanging out with Kun and Sicheng. He could use that to order the lamb skewers at the night market his dad claimed he’d loved so much as a kid when they vacationed in China.

He gets tossed a Coke can by Hendery after they step out from the store. “If you needed it,” he shrugs, watching as Lucas takes it from him, a perpetual lift at the corners of his mouth. The Coke is fresh out of the chiller, and Lucas holds on to the cold surface longer before he gives it back to Hendery to share. The sky is clear, with the sun high and pouring an almost liquid warmth down their backs. 

Back inside the car, Hendery goes on about this movie he’s seen as a kid, sitting beside his older sister, who was barely paying attention to the movie and texting on her phone. The movie was set in high school, and he’d been charmed by the main character breaking the fourth wall. 

The drive to San Francisco wouldn’t take more than two hours. 

“Two hours are going to fly by. Before you know it, we’ll be waving Kun goodbye before his flight out of here,” Hendery points out, waiting in silence for a response from the backseat. This was after all, Yangyang’s idea.

If Lucas were to mull it over in his head, he can pick out three things he knows about Yangyang, no problem. They’ve spent enough neighborhood community gatherings circling around mutual acquaintances and friends that Lucas can’t count off his fingers anymore—he recalls easily that Yangyang would choose Sprite over any other soda. He makes a show of doing a bad job at something mundane, which used to drive Kun crazy so he’d do it for Yangyang instead, which was what Yangyang intends for all the time anyway. Yangyang is the only reason why Lucas knows how to cuss in German. 

Meanwhile, most of the things he knows about Hendery from the three years of knowing him ever since they met at a blurry college party, is implicit,without Hendery telling him. Hendery had grown up idolizing the likes of Tony Leung and maybe even Jolin Tsai from his DVD and album collection. Hendery only ever orders tom yam when they get Thai food. He prefers sleeping without any lights on, even in unfamiliar places.

Except in broad daylight in a moving vehicle; Hendery’s already dozing off now when they’re on the Bay Bridge, breathing even with his head lolled to the side, expensive sunglasses slipping to the end of his nose precariously and looking for a perfect situation to get its lens scratched if it falls.

The playlist is Lucas’ now, Travis Scott in between classics on low volume that Yangyang flicks through on Lucas’ phone.

“Kun hijacked your playlist,” Yangyang says, not a question, but a statement.

Lucas frowns at the cars ahead of him, trying to remember when that ever happened, but he stays quiet, and lets Yangyang continue on his tirade of changing songs after each second verse until he settles on Celine Dion. 

They slow down in traffic. Hendery shifts in his seat, eyes open now and still glazed over with sleepiness.

“What.” He raises his eyebrows at Lucas who looks away.

Behind his own shades, Lucas blinks away the glare from another car, light shining from its mirrors. He tries to hide his smile in the curve of his own palm, feeling the weight of the words in his mouth, and lets it sink back in his chest. “Nothing,” he says.

Yangyang tries to see the best way to go about things. They’ve decided on driving around the city until they’ll finally park on Sicheng’s street and Kun will come over, waking hours flipped from jet lag. So they have about four more hours to kill until then. Here’s the good thing about being friends with someone like Sicheng—he’s a regular at a lot of the nice bistros in this city thanks to his uncles always bringing him out. His family has extended that perk to his friends by spontaneously inviting whomever is over at their house hanging out with Sicheng in their living room, to dinners.

The waiter promptly makes a reservation for them under Dong Sicheng’s name when Yangyang calls the restaurant.

“What did Sicheng say?” Hendery asks.

“Do I have to tell Sicheng?”

Hendery twists around in his seat, watches the way Yangyang fidgets. Lucas just laughs, drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “I think you have to,” Lucas tells him.

“It’s cool, I was kidding. He said to go ahead and that he’s sorry he won’t be able to see us until later tonight,” Yangyang explains through his shark-like grin. Sicheng’s job wasn’t something he could skip out on very often but depending on how one looks at things, Sicheng isn’t a very convincing liar either when it comes to ditching.

The complimentary alcohol only includes white wine, which only tastes better by the time they’ve whittled down the bottle to the last few glasses. 

Lucas gurgles out something close to awe and distress—Yangyang can’t tell which. “You know what I’m scared of? That in a few years, Sicheng’s going to force us to drink wine exclusively from Italian vineyards and we won’t be able to _ not _tell the differences anymore.” 

Hendery is already pulling up his phone to backtrack the group chat to the photo that Sicheng sent of him and his girlfriend, against a lilac sky with soft spots of light glowing beneath them at dusk in Rome, marking their fifth anniversary. They don’t know yet when the wedding will be. But the move to Italy was decided ever since Sicheng was like, probably born, with his family in the wine import business.

It’s that train of thought that sits, has probably been stirring itself into some weird plane of reality for Lucas, and maybe Hendery too. Ever since Sicheng announced his engagement and Kun had just left for China to accept a job offering there in Shanghai, while Lucas and Hendery sped past graduation. Yangyang still has a year to go before college ends and well—he’s just trying to see the best way to go about things.

Yangyang had gotten that message from Kun a few days ago at 6 AM, squinted at the screen before realizing that he messaged in WhatsApp and _ not _ WeChat—before finally his sleep-addled brain registered that he had transited through Hong Kong and is in San Francisco for a short vacation. 

Yangyang comes back from the restroom, and finds a tiny chocolate lava cake sitting there on the table, the top snowy with powdered sugar. Lucas and Hendery are looking at it like there’s a bomb in it. 

“Don’t look at me; this is, again _complimentary, _” Lucas says, a touch defensive in his tone.

Hendery with his infamous sweet tooth, looks a little pink, which isn’t the alcohol because there’s barely any hit in the white wine. That’s when Yangyang laughs, loud enough that he feels the trio of middle-aged women look at him funny but he doesn’t lower his voice.

“Don’t back down now and pay for the cake,” Yangyang whispers furiously in Hendery’s ear when he looks like he’s about to turn around out of guilt and do exactly that as they leave.

Outside, everything seems louder, brighter against a smooth blue sky but it’s mostly the effect of this bustling city. Snatches of conversation fly by and cars honking in the distance sear through the heat and illuminated dust lit up by the sun through the windshield as they get into the car. 

“So where to now? The museum? And then the game?” Lucas asks, window rolled down.

“Yeah. Let’s go,” Yangyang agrees, rubbing his hands together in glee.

Lucas laughs heartily in response. From this angle where Yangyang is directly behind Lucas’ seat, Hendery’s cheeks are rounded the way they get when he’s amused and smiling and Yangyang gets it—he completely understands why the staff at the restaurant had mistaken them for what they aren’t, and ridiculously, but so kindly offered them good service and the cake.

Yangyang leans against the back seat, stretches out his limbs, satisfied.

The last time they’d been to an art museum, was when Ten, a mutual friend, invited them to his art exhibit back in town. This is the first time they visit _ any _ museum in San Francisco but like nearly all museums, it’s a shimmer of quiet stillness that they wander around in, broken only by the murmurs of conversation. 

They end up trailing behind a class of elementary students on a field trip; the shortest boy of the group who seems to think Lucas is funny because of how he describes the vibrant art pieces, ends up holding his hand, dragging him along to join the congo line of kids, a towering goose at the end of a line of ducklings. Lucas grabs onto Hendery’s hand, barely— Hendery shakes him off as he doubles over in laughter and flashes a peace sign for Yangyang to post on his Instagram stories.

They stare and stare at paintings and sculptures, until their thoughts drift in the middle of trying to figure what else the works can mean. There’s one showing off gentle features and rosy cheeks that Hendery points out: _ doesn’t that remind you guys of Kun when he’s drunk? _ Lucas nods while Yangyang blinks. _ Only if you squint, _is Yangyang’s answer and Hendery scoffs; after all, Yangyang had always known Kun better.

Sicheng had moved out of the apartment that he shared with Kun and Xiaojun, and found a replacement quickly enough—Kun was just thrilled and relieved beyond anything else that he didn’t have to worry about the rent for too long. Yangyang stepped in, bumbling fresh out of high school and stepping out of his worn Vans to pad barefoot in awe around the place (his mother had approved, saw Kun as the perfect roommate for her son). And then Yangyang started bringing over Lucas, who was already a sophomore by then and has known since they were ten (when Yangyang’s English was still sharper in accent coming from Germany), and battling each other with fake lightsabers. Eventually, Hendery started hanging around as well when he’d been Xiaojun’s partner in one of their classes, having already met Lucas and Yangyang at a college party hosted by Yuta Nakamoto and Johnny Seo. That all happened in a span of an excruciatingly slow year.

It should be said now that Hendery has also hooked up with Lucas during the most stressful semester of his life in their senior year; although ultimately that _ really _helped a lot with the stress.

It’s even funnier how they kept that up for about two months before Hendery felt he needed to end it.

(“Maybe we should stop. We’re graduating in spring,” Hendery said. No, it’s not the sex, that was good, and Lucas had just blinked with a relieved _oh_ before listening again, his hand moving to a respectable position now on the bed next to Hendery. Maybe this was a waste of time for both of them, that they were too good as friends who still weren’t looking for anything serious. Lucas stared at him calmly, the cogs turning in his head before he agreed. Too easily, it seemed. They'd needed to talk things out after, about the thing that hung in the air between them. They don't really talk about it again, even if Lucas downloaded WeChat just to keep sending Hendery memes and kept him connected when he went to Beijing, and that, well. It kept the yearning and maybe's burning bright in Hendery's chest.)

The way the restaurant staff earlier had mistaken them for a couple really takes the cake—literally.

To Hendery, it’s fucking hilarious how things turn out if he takes a step backwards to look at it every which way.

Yangyang trying to see the best way to go about his life includes not counting down the hours they have until 5 pm, when people fill the streets, head home from their desk jobs, when food trucks have packed up for the day and are getting ready to drive off. At least, that’s how Hendery thinks of it when he empathizes as best he can, sitting there and continuously eating fries that he’s stolen off of Lucas, who is engrossed in the game but not as wildly immersed as Yangyang on the other side of Hendery. 

There’s plenty to not think about right now when the Braves are starting to fall behind by the fourth inning. But Hendery notices how Yangyang keeps his eyes on the field, anxious.

“If they don’t win this, I’m going to take this as a sign that San Francisco today was a bad idea,” Yangyang mutters under his breath. “_ Shit— _ you see that? What the hell was _ that? _” He yells, almost knocking back Hendery’s Pepsi and around them, the crowd moans out their shared disappointment for the home team. It’s a tie now between the Braves and the Giants.

“You believe in superstition? Involving baseball games?” Lucas asks, frowning at the field. He reaches for a fry, big hands feeling around before he realizes the tray is empty and Hendery offers him his drink wordlessly as an apology.

“No. I believe in the signs that lead up to something,” Yangyang says, and his voice swells along with the crowd in their cheers when the Giants score and they don’t say anything again throughout the bottom of the game.

Of course, that was how it was:

For someone who tries to see things positively and make the best out of life, Yangyang often didn’t wrench his hands into what he thinks might be fate, a string of tacit signs like pointer arrows Yangyang is influenced by. 

And then Lucas, who has now taken ownership of Hendery’s large Pepsi, will do what he does best, will try to assure them that some things aren’t worth treating like spilled milk. It’s this thing about him that explains why Lucas sends out job applications at a slow steady pace, because he—frankly, none of them really have any concrete idea with what they’re doing so they just—do and hope for the best. 

Underneath the film of grease and salt in his mouth and fingers, Hendery can still taste the sweet richness of the lava cake they’d had. And then, it occurs to him suddenly, a strange needling thought that maybe, Yangyang isn’t all too reluctant to twist fate in his hands or whatever. Can spontaneity be planned?

There’s the heat of Lucas’ thigh against his right knee and his arm lined up along Hendery’s before it disappears when he surges forward in his seat. Yangyang is shaking Hendery’s other arm as Hendery jolts, gapes open-mouthed and cheers together along with the crowd at the Giants’ victory.

If there’s anything that old movie he’d watched with his sister had taught him, it’s that you could blink, and miss it, life. Everyone hears that life doesn’t stop for anyone. Hendery sure knows he doesn’t want to be like the people who never actually listen when they hear things.

Sicheng’s apartment is still the same with its boring clean white walls, and colorful paraphernalia of empty alcohol bottles and mason jars he uses to store his cooking ingredients in. Kun had helped organize them and label them, taught him how to make something out of his default stock of egg, rice, canned meat and an array of sauces before he moved out. 

Hendery’s right about what he said; two hours will fly by. 

With Kun and Sicheng and the sun down, windows open to let in the night breeze, they finally crack open the now chilled beer that they share together with _ baijiu _that goes down just right. Lucas blinks rapidly through the steam from the hotpot in the middle, his eyes drying up momentarily as he leans forward to help himself to getting more meat. 

Eventually, when he’s drunk enough, Lucas will need to sit closer by the window on the open balcony, tiny and bare, with only one healthy houseplant taking up residence there.

Kun appears beside him silently. Lucas won’t remember too much of the details of what they talk about but this: the stubborn fumbling urge rising in his chest, a funny tickling sort of bitterness he thought he’d forgotten over the months.

And then the dimming surprise when Kun says, “I’ve sort of always known,” as he looks down below to the curb.

Lucas doesn’t really know what to say then, so he squeezes Kun’s shoulder, the twinkling lights blurring in the distance below them. Down below on the pavement, they can see the others’ heads, sitting out on the curb. The smoke from Sicheng’s cigarette is almost invisible in the late evening. Yangyang and Hendery are starting to do some sort of skit for Sicheng because their coordinated hand and hip movements are making Sicheng stumble backwards in embarrassment. It’s supposed to be funny even from here, so Lucas smiles at that.

“Don’t feel so sorry,” Lucas says, his tone almost pleading, wheedling to get Kun to smile and it works. “Just tell him something,” he supplies and Kun just laughs. Looks away from the street.

“Take your own advice, why don’t you,” Kun says, except Lucas knows he isn’t joking.

Moments later, Lucas slips into bed, the lump of a smaller person next to him rolling around and facing him. It makes his heart jump before it constricts. He’d been half hoping Hendery would have been asleep by now.

“Now are we going to talk?” Hendery mumbles, speech still slurred, like he’s trying to fight to stay awake.

“You’re tired,” Lucas mutters, but Hendery frowns. Lucas has the urge to smooth the crease in his brows with his thumb.

“I need to tell you, by the way, that Beijing was kind of lonely without any of you. Especially you,” Hendery says quietly.

His knee knocks against Lucas’ thigh and he keeps it there, something familiar, something Lucas knows he’s missed. He used to feel that in the early morning until Hendery would get up from his bed, leave the sheets tangled over the edge all messy, while he puts on his clothes and slips out. Lucas made an even bigger mess, his bad eyesight to blame when Hendery stirred awake from the noise.

This is the part where Kun’s bit about taking his own advice echoes in his head, makes Lucas licks his lips nervously.

”I missed you,” Lucas says softly, the air shuddering into a vulnerability he hasn’t felt in a long time when Hendery parts his lips, eyes clearer than ever. “Are we just going to pretend that we don’t want this?” Lucas asks, his pulse fluttering as he searches over Hendery’s face, calm and still in the dim room, the lamp backlit against his outline.

“We’re in the heart of San Francisco where I was taken hostage. It’s too late to pretend.” Hendery’s eyes are like dark pools shining.

Lucas pinches his wrist playfully, before he holds Hendery's hand, keeping his grip loose but Hendery doesn’t pull away. “Good,” Lucas says, hiding his grin into the pillow and Hendery hums, eyes closing.

Yangyang definitely likes trying to see the best out of things, but making the best out of a dire situation? Debatable.

At 3 am in the morning, he almost trips over Kun’s duffel bag when he stumbles out of the toilet in the spare room holding his brandless travel kit toothbrush and toothpaste. 

“Yangyang?” Kun’s voice comes up, hoarse and quiet and Yangyang almost jumps. “Oh, good. Thought it was you,” he just says, voice drifting.

Yangyang just groans into the pullout bed on the floor, his head still spinning from all the alcohol.

“I don’t really want to keep leaving again. Never thought I’d say this, but America is easy to miss when you’re all here,” Kun suddenly says, his voice carrying through and into the dark slants of shadows in the room. 

“You miss us?”

“Of course.” 

Of course. It’s always been like that, then.

Yangyang can hear the smile in Kun’s answer. Yangyang sighs, the heaviness now weighing in his limbs by tenfold so he feels like he could bury himself in this mattress, face pressing against the pillow and inhaling the faint scent of fabric conditioner. He’s turned it over again and again in his head, Lucas and Hendery reminding him even, about how much time Yangyang spent on a stupid crush that’s aged like wine throughout the years, even after Kun graduated and left. Wine gets better with age, and this isn’t like wine. 

By the time Yangyang feels like he needs to breathe again, he exhales and his chest feels lighter.

“It’s okay, ge. Just letting you know that I’m doing fine. Have you been worrying about me? Because that’d be really sad,” Yangyang mutters.

Kun laughs either way, a soft chuckle. “Yeah. I should stop worrying. You’re doing fine. You’ll always be fine.”

The silence doesn’t drill through Yangyang’s head, and the white noise that’s been causing a stormy tornado rattling through his heart as he listens to Kun’s steady soft breathing, is dying down: _Maybe I’ll always like you in some way. But now that’s not what this will be about anymore. _

“Thanks for coming to see me,” Kun says so quietly that Yangyang almost misses that. 

Yangyang smiles, and that comes easy. “Well, we try,” he says.

The drive back feels more sluggish, more psychosomatic effect than the heat. It starts to drizzle, sunshine still bursting through the clouds and all, and this seems to wake Hendery up again in the passenger seat. Yangyang presses his nose against the window to look out over the sea.

“I’m not sure I believe in signs anymore, but I’ll let myself think that the weather is trying to tell us something,” Yangyang says.

“Good or bad?” Lucas asks. “Because I think we can decide on that for ourselves.”

“Right. It’s good, in this case,” Yangyang declares over the new Jay Chou album that Kun had infiltrated Yangyang’s own playlist with, just several hours ago over breakfast before they drove him to the airport.

“Yeah. Things are okay,” Hendery says, sharing a glance with Lucas before he twists around to smile at Yangyang. “Everything’s gonna be okay, no matter what.”


End file.
